Some legal scholars felt the mandate would be struck down by the high court but the Supremes kept the power of Congress to impose the mandate as a tax if necessary but Chief Justice John Roberts joined the court’s liberal side to five the mandate a victory.

Wrote Roberts in the court’s opinion:

If an individual does not maintain health insurance, the only consequence is that he must make an additional payment to the IRS when he pays his taxes. It makes going without insurance just another thing the government taxes, like buying gasoline or earning an income.

In other words, you pay either way.

Opponents of Obamacare wanted the mandate declared unconstitutional or, at the very least, left up to states but the court left the power with Congress.

The court did rule unconstitutional the provision that allowed the federal government to withhold Medicaid funds from states that refused to expand the program under the act but left in place the expansion itself.

The individual mandate was challenged by 26 states, which brought the issue before the Supreme Court.

While the court decision gives Obama a clear victory in a tough election year, it also provides his opponents a strong political issue. Polls show the individual mandate is not popular with many Americans and Republicans will use that dissension to try and increase their presence in Congress and overthrow the act next year.

“People, for reasons of their own, often fail to do things that would be good for them or good for society. Those failures — joined with the similar failures of others — can readily have a substantial effect on interstate commerce. Under the Government’s logic, that authorizes Congress to use its commerce power to compel citizens to act as the Government would have them act. That is not the country the Framers of our Constitution envisioned.” – CJ Roberts

Very suprising decision!….I thought for sure it’d go the other way….I’m in favor of Obamacare, because it’s a badly-needed reform…Way, way overdue….Presidents going back to Ike and Truman and others forward wanted some form of national health insurance.